The GM team is completely ineffective.

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Originally Posted by Jessica_VS

The problem herein is that what constitutes "spam" is subjective at best.

Examples:

1. The shouting of "YOOOOO" in the Gold Saucer when Yojimbo appears. Does this qualify? I'd say no, but I saw an argument yesterday evening in the Gold Saucer over this very thing.

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I would love to have been a fly on the wall for this conversation.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

I don't know if it's the team itself or the policies, but it's completely ineffective. Absolutely nothing gets done. I've taken to reporting spam again in recent weeks. It's all over the place, I've submitted reports for the same names (yes, it's always the same character) so many times and nothing is ever done about it.

This came to a boiling point last night when I actually got to speak to- what I assume was- a living, breathing actual human GM. I asked them to tell me, point blank, if what I was constantly reporting was actually against TOS. Their response was telling me they could not provide me with any conclusive answers.

This is, of course, entirely unacceptable. If anybody should be able to provide conclusive answers, it's a GM. This isn't even to mention how- if by some measure of bad luck- you actually manage to get suspended, you won't be told what you got suspended for. You'll be told what part of the TOS you violated, but you won't be given the specific incident, meaning you just have to guess at what happened.

Once again, this is entirely unacceptable. I can only be led to believe that the GM team is either incredibly overworked at best, or completely incompetent at worst. To be honest, I don't care which one it is. I want to see better from the community. I want to see actual courtesy, I want to see the GMs enforcing their own rules. The bottom line is, it needs to be better.

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Have you placed the player that is annoying you on your blacklist yet?

Because that would solve your problem very neatly. You already know that you don't want to have to read what they're posting in shout chat. Putting that player on your blacklist ensures you will never have to read it again.

If the GMs haven't done anything about that player yet, then chances are good you are the only one that's been reporting them. They don't have reason to take action just because you say they must, especially when you have a tool available that would take care of your problem if you would use it.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

Have you placed the player that is annoying you on your blacklist yet?

Because that would solve your problem very neatly. You already know that you don't want to have to read what they're posting in shout chat. Putting that player on your blacklist ensures you will never have to read it again.

If the GMs haven't done anything about that player yet, then chances are good you are the only one that's been reporting them. They don't have reason to take action just because you say they must, especially when you have a tool available that would take care of your problem if you would use it.

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The blacklist is not infinite. I am not the only one reporting them because I know for a fact there are other people reporting them. The blacklist is not infinite. They need to take action even if that action is telling us they're not taking action. The blacklist is not infinite. The GM team, bottom line, needs to be better. The blacklist is not infinite. Have I mentioned the blacklist is not infinite?

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

The blacklist is not infinite. I am not the only one reporting them because I know for a fact there are other people reporting them. The blacklist is not infinite. They need to take action even if that action is telling us they're not taking action. The blacklist is not infinite. The GM team, bottom line, needs to be better. The blacklist is not infinite. Have I mentioned the blacklist is not infinite?

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I think we're all aware that the blacklist is not infinite. But that 200 cap is extremely generous. No reasonable person is ever going to feel so strongly about 200 other players that need to have that many blacklisted.

I've been playing this game for 8 years now and I've felt a need to blacklist maybe a dozen players during that time. After a few months, I take them back off my blacklist. There has only been one that I've had to add back to it. And it's not that they're a bad person. They're just extremely annoying with their emote spam during hunt trains. So if they start spamming during trains, I put them on my blacklist then take them back off later. Temporary problem has solution and stops being a problem.

That's not to say that there aren't players with legitimate reasons to keep certain players on their blacklists. There are psychos out there that focus on someone and don't let go. Those individuals are better on blacklists.

That is not your problem, though. Your problem is you look for reasons to be offended and outraged for petty reasons. You believe that others should do what you say for your convenience.

You are indeed a Karen even if you don't want to admit it.

Game advice: clear out your blacklist. Chances are good that 95% of those you've placed on it you'll never encounter again and 4 of the remaining 5% will turn out to be perfectly friendly people who might have been having a bad day when you decided to blacklist them. Repeat this at the start of every month if you continue to add players to it. Chances are good you'll discover that the number on your blacklist remains small and it's extremely rare that you need to re-add a specific player.

Life advice: learn to ignore the petty stuff. You're only stressing yourself out and stress is terrible for your health.

I've stopped reporting spammers and RMTers because nothing ever gets done.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

I think we're all aware that the blacklist is not infinite. But that 200 cap is extremely generous. No reasonable person is ever going to feel so strongly about 200 other players that need to have that many blacklisted.

I've been playing this game for 8 years now and I've felt a need to blacklist maybe a dozen players during that time. After a few months, I take them back off my blacklist. There has only been one that I've had to add back to it. And it's not that they're a bad person. They're just extremely annoying with their emote spam during hunt trains. So if they start spamming during trains, I put them on my blacklist then take them back off later. Temporary problem has solution and stops being a problem.

That's not to say that there aren't players with legitimate reasons to keep certain players on their blacklists. There are psychos out there that focus on someone and don't let go. Those individuals are better on blacklists.

That is not your problem, though. Your problem is you look for reasons to be offended and outraged for petty reasons. You believe that others should do what you say for your convenience.

You are indeed a Karen even if you don't want to admit it.

Game advice: clear out your blacklist. Chances are good that 95% of those you've placed on it you'll never encounter again and 4 of the remaining 5% will turn out to be perfectly friendly people who might have been having a bad day when you decided to blacklist them. Repeat this at the start of every month if you continue to add players to it. Chances are good you'll discover that the number on your blacklist remains small and it's extremely rare that you need to re-add a specific player.

Life advice: learn to ignore the petty stuff. You're only stressing yourself out and stress is terrible for your health.

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Yes, me being frustrated with the terrible GM policies means I'm looking for reasons to be offended and outraged. You couldn't be further from the mark. So let me give you a bit of advice as well, since we're doing psychological evaluations of each other now.

Nothing's ever going to get done just by thinking about it hard enough. If you want something done, or changed, you have to push for it. Ignorance is not always bliss. I imagine your life is a very happy one.

"This is, of course, entirely unacceptable. If anybody should be able to provide conclusive answers, it's a GM. This isn't even to mention how- if by some measure of bad luck- you actually manage to get suspended, you won't be told what you got suspended for. You'll be told what part of the TOS you violated, but you won't be given the specific incident, meaning you just have to guess at what happened."

They are specifically trained to only answer what they are allowed to answer. Because there are people who will try to social engineer their way into getting information they aren't supposed to get. PirateSoftware explains it well. He works as a game dev, and offensive security expert. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAWwtjtRM98

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

I think we're all aware that the blacklist is not infinite. But that 200 cap is extremely generous. No reasonable person is ever going to feel so strongly about 200 other players that need to have that many blacklisted.

I've been playing this game for 8 years now and I've felt a need to blacklist maybe a dozen players during that time. After a few months, I take them back off my blacklist. There has only been one that I've had to add back to it. And it's not that they're a bad person. They're just extremely annoying with their emote spam during hunt trains. So if they start spamming during trains, I put them on my blacklist then take them back off later. Temporary problem has solution and stops being a problem.

That's not to say that there aren't players with legitimate reasons to keep certain players on their blacklists. There are psychos out there that focus on someone and don't let go. Those individuals are better on blacklists.

That is not your problem, though. Your problem is you look for reasons to be offended and outraged for petty reasons. You believe that others should do what you say for your convenience.

You are indeed a Karen even if you don't want to admit it.

Game advice: clear out your blacklist. Chances are good that 95% of those you've placed on it you'll never encounter again and 4 of the remaining 5% will turn out to be perfectly friendly people who might have been having a bad day when you decided to blacklist them. Repeat this at the start of every month if you continue to add players to it. Chances are good you'll discover that the number on your blacklist remains small and it's extremely rare that you need to re-add a specific player.

Life advice: learn to ignore the petty stuff. You're only stressing yourself out and stress is terrible for your health.

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in 5 years I have blacklisted maybe 3 between all 10 of my characters.1 for some serious griefing and the other 2 for really disgusting sexually explicit requests that also caused me to delete my Lalafel character.

the title of this thread is a bit disingenuous since there are times when the gm's actually do their job. i had a weird stalker and reported racially disparaging comments, both users got deleted. maybe they just take action on more pressing issues rather than what this thread is really about: gm's inability to tackle a venue's advertisements taking up a good portion of pf. not saying that it might not be pressing to YOU, but maybe to gm's, they're just like ...yeah, ok, and....?

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Originally Posted by Gokki

I've stopped reporting spammers and RMTers because nothing ever gets done.

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When it comes to spammers, we're back to subjective opinion. The game's definition for spammer seems to be someone who fills the chat window completely with rapid repetition of a specific message so that others are unable to converse. Repeating the same message once every 5-10 minutes isn't going to be considered spam under that definition.

RMT activity is handled by the Special Task Force and not the GMs as a rule. The ad spambots do get banned on a weekly basis. But there's no way to stop RMT from making new accounts and characters to continue the spam.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

Yes, me being frustrated with the terrible GM policies means I'm looking for reasons to be offended and outraged. You couldn't be further from the mark. So let me give you a bit of advice as well, since we're doing psychological evaluations of each other now.

Nothing's ever going to get done just by thinking about it hard enough. If you want something done, or changed, you have to push for it. Ignorance is not always bliss. I imagine your life is a very happy one.

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What terrible policy are you referring to? That they don't immediately ban someone just on your personal say so?

Just because you want something to be done does not mean that it should be done.

Adding someone to a blacklist doesn't mean you're living in ignorance. You should know that with your personal extensive use of the blacklist to the point you don't have room to add this one character to it.

Learn which battles are worth fighting and which aren't. You may not agree with this other player and the message they're sharing but nothing you've said makes it sound like it's mean-spirited or damaging in any way, only that it could be annoying.

And yes, my life did improve immensely once I taught myself what battles are worth fighting and what can be safely ignored. I wouldn't say I'm very happy but I'm a lot happier than I was when I was obsessed with petty stuff and things that can't be changed. People will be people. Some will end up an annoyance depending on your personal preferences but they're rarely causing any actual harm to anyone.

Instead of investing your energy into trying to fight this particular battle, put the player on ignore and invest the energy into playing the game. Or don't and stay angry because you can't get others to see things your way. Your life, your choice.

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Originally Posted by Myrany

in 5 years I have blacklisted maybe 3 between all 10 of my characters.1 for some serious griefing and the other 2 for really disgusting sexually explicit requests that also caused me to delete my Lalafel character.

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Sorry you felt that you had to delete your character. With the improved blacklist coming in Dawntrail, hopefully no one will feel that's a necessary step ever again.

But your situation was very different from what the OP's situation is. The OP is way overreacting here and refuses to use a simple tool that would remove what's annoying them from their chat.

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Originally Posted by alpineth

the title of this thread is a bit disingenuous since there are times when the gm's actually do their job. i had a weird stalker and reported racially disparaging comments, both users got deleted. maybe they just take action on more pressing issues rather than what this thread is really about: gm's inability to tackle a venue's advertisements taking up a good portion of pf. not saying that it might not be pressing to YOU, but maybe to gm's, they're just like ...yeah, ok, and....?

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Venue ads might be spam or might not be. Are they annoying to those not interested in the venues? Sure, but they're also easily ignored if you're actively playing the game instead of using all your time to hang out in Limsa.

The OP's complaint doesn't seem to really be about venues, though. They seem to be about one particular player who has posted a message with a religious overtone in shout chat on multiple occasions (they had mentioned this is in a bit more detail in the other thread they mention was deleted by the moderators).

People tend to skim past the following statement in the Prohibited Activities policy:

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Communication can take place in a variety of styles. As such, we do not prohibit specific words or sentences. Instead, we look at the whole picture in order to judge the intent and meaning of the communication, in conjunction with how the person on the receiving end perceived it, to determine whether or not the exchange falls under prohibited activities.

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While discussion of topics that tend to prompt sensitive reactions are discouraged, they are not outright prohibited. What is prohibited is discriminatory speech that is intolerant of differing points of view or intended to begin arguments between players.

As an example, someone saying "Remember Jesus loves you, I hope you have a great day!" isn't prohibited. Unless other things were said to give it a different context, it comes across as friendly and caring. Regardless of your personal spiritual beliefs, there's not really anything offensive to be found in what the player said. The GMs have no reason to take action against that player.

If what they had said was "If you don't love Jesus, you're damned to Hell", that would be considered discriminatory and inflammatory. The GMs probably would choose to take action against the player at that point.

Are some players going to be sensitive to religious references for any number of reasons? Yes. But all they have to do is put that player on their blacklist, along with any other players that might choose to turn that into a discussion, and they won't have to listen to it anymore. Personal issue, simple solution.

So the OP reports the other player for putting a religious reference into shout chat, GMs review what's said against what's in the Prohibited Activties policy, finds it's not actually prohibited and so don't take action against the player. OP gets mad that the other player can continue to post a religious reference into shout chat and decides to try to get them silenced for "spam" or "nuisance behavior". They refuse to put the player on their blacklist because They Must Know! what the other player says so they can report it. Again, GMs review and don't find what the other player is doing to be prohibited under the policy. OP starts to rage and takes it to the forums, where they get very little sympathy because few people like someone trying to shut down another person's ability to express a non-discriminatory opinion.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

Sorry you felt that you had to delete your character. With the improved blacklist coming in Dawntrail, hopefully no one will feel that's a necessary step ever again.

But your situation was very different from what the OP's situation is. The OP is way overreacting here and refuses to use a simple tool that would remove what's annoying them from their chat.

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I have hope for the new blacklists.

I was actually trying to reinforce your idea that for many of us the 200 limit really feels like no limit at all since we rarely blacklist

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Originally Posted by Myrany

I have hope for the new blacklists.

I was actually trying to reinforce your idea that for many of us the 200 limit really feels like no limit at all since we rarely blacklist

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Oh, I know it was supportive. I just wanted to express my sadness that it got so bad you ended up deleting your lalafell and point out for those not aware that there is some hope coming for those likewise affected.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

When it comes to spammers, we're back to subjective opinion. The game's definition for spammer seems to be someone who fills the chat window completely with rapid repetition of a specific message so that others are unable to converse. Repeating the same message once every 5-10 minutes isn't going to be considered spam under that definition.

RMT activity is handled by the Special Task Force and not the GMs as a rule. The ad spambots do get banned on a weekly basis. But there's no way to stop RMT from making new accounts and characters to continue the spam.


What terrible policy are you referring to? That they don't immediately ban someone just on your personal say so?

Just because you want something to be done does not mean that it should be done.

Adding someone to a blacklist doesn't mean you're living in ignorance. You should know that with your personal extensive use of the blacklist to the point you don't have room to add this one character to it.

Learn which battles are worth fighting and which aren't. You may not agree with this other player and the message they're sharing but nothing you've said makes it sound like it's mean-spirited or damaging in any way, only that it could be annoying.

And yes, my life did improve immensely once I taught myself what battles are worth fighting and what can be safely ignored. I wouldn't say I'm very happy but I'm a lot happier than I was when I was obsessed with petty stuff and things that can't be changed. People will be people. Some will end up an annoyance depending on your personal preferences but they're rarely causing any actual harm to anyone.

Instead of investing your energy into trying to fight this particular battle, put the player on ignore and invest the energy into playing the game. Or don't and stay angry because you can't get others to see things your way. Your life, your choice.


Sorry you felt that you had to delete your character. With the improved blacklist coming in Dawntrail, hopefully no one will feel that's a necessary step ever again.

But your situation was very different from what the OP's situation is. The OP is way overreacting here and refuses to use a simple tool that would remove what's annoying them from their chat.


Venue ads might be spam or might not be. Are they annoying to those not interested in the venues? Sure, but they're also easily ignored if you're actively playing the game instead of using all your time to hang out in Limsa.

The OP's complaint doesn't seem to really be about venues, though. They seem to be about one particular player who has posted a message with a religious overtone in shout chat on multiple occasions (they had mentioned this is in a bit more detail in the other thread they mention was deleted by the moderators).

People tend to skim past the following statement in the Prohibited Activities policy:



While discussion of topics that tend to prompt sensitive reactions are discouraged, they are not outright prohibited. What is prohibited is discriminatory speech that is intolerant of differing points of view or intended to begin arguments between players.

As an example, someone saying "Remember Jesus loves you, I hope you have a great day!" isn't prohibited. Unless other things were said to give it a different context, it comes across as friendly and caring. Regardless of your personal spiritual beliefs, there's not really anything offensive to be found in what the player said. The GMs have no reason to take action against that player.

If what they had said was "If you don't love Jesus, you're damned to Hell", that would be considered discriminatory and inflammatory. The GMs probably would choose to take action against the player at that point.

Are some players going to be sensitive to religious references for any number of reasons? Yes. But all they have to do is put that player on their blacklist, along with any other players that might choose to turn that into a discussion, and they won't have to listen to it anymore. Personal issue, simple solution.

So the OP reports the other player for putting a religious reference into shout chat, GMs review what's said against what's in the Prohibited Activties policy, finds it's not actually prohibited and so don't take action against the player. OP gets mad that the other player can continue to post a religious reference into shout chat and decides to try to get them silenced for "spam" or "nuisance behavior". They refuse to put the player on their blacklist because They Must Know! what the other player says so they can report it. Again, GMs review and don't find what the other player is doing to be prohibited under the policy. OP starts to rage and takes it to the forums, where they get very little sympathy because few people like someone trying to shut down another person's ability to express a non-discriminatory opinion.

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It's really not worth it to engage with you either, we're both clearly set in our own thoughts. You think the GM team is infallible, I think they're terrible and need to change to be better.

So lets start with this misunderstanding you have: I'm not referring to someone posting messages with "religious overtones." I wasn't even aware that was a thread at some point. So I'm not really sure where you got that from and why you're attributing it to me. If you read my original post clearly (which you did not) I stated it was multiple people. Now, to give you the benefit of the doubt, maybe you mistook me saying "the same names (yes, it's always the same character)" as meaning one individual. What I meant was, it's the same names and worlds for each person, not the same name but a different world. So your whole assumption with your last paragraph is... it's just wrong. You're wrong. I don't know what else to say about it other than you're flat out wrong.

The pf venue spam is absurd and I genuinely think something should be done about it. I'm personally not holding out hope for Dawntrail's filters to actually work. They said there will be chat filters, which is great, that's a step in the right direction, but knowing SQenix's history, I highly doubt these filters will apply to party finder. I will be shocked if I am wrong about this and will happily declare that I was wrong. I want to be wrong about this because it means they're actually taking a step in the right direction.

Now, to go back to the pf venue spam, because I know some people are going to come out and say "lmao this person wants to ban rpers" kind of like what you're doing in saying "OP wants to silence others," I'm not actually against ads. I'm not. I think it's great that there's such a large community around this scene. I don't personally interact with it, but more power to them. My issue is when there's too many of the same listing. I don't understand what's so hard about being courteous and stopping to think for a second "do we really need 8 different posts for this" and coming to the conclusion that no, we actually don't need this many. This leads me back to my first interaction with you on this thread when I told you the blacklist isn't infinite. I shouldn't have to blacklist 8 new names every two weeks to keep that section somewhat readable. It shouldn't be an issue in the first place, it should've been shut down ages ago. This is not how it's always been, this is something that's new to Endwalker. I remember when having as many as 3 listings for the same thing was considered, politely, "rude."

So now that I've gone through that, let me repeat my points for at least the sixth or seventh time on this particular thread. I believe the GM team should communicate more. I believe the GM team should be able to tell you "we don't think this is against Terms of Service." I believe the GM team should be able to give you a solid answer on that. I don't believe the GM should rely on "Although we cannot inform you of the outcome due to privacy reasons..." excuse because frankly, it's crap. How is it that so many other games are able to let you know "hey someone you reported had action taken against them" but yet the infallible Square Enix can't? It's crap, that's why.

On top of that, I have no idea what sort of thread you're reading because there's definitely a good mix of people here going "yeah the GM team is great" and "yeah the GM team kind of sucks." You're obviously in the former camp, I'm in the latter camp.

I reiterate. They're ineffective. I don't know if it's the team or the policies, but once again, it's ineffective. I don't believe that someone should get banned for "killing too many mobs" when they were trying to spawn an S rank. Remember that thread? What about back in October, the guy who streamed himself hacking in PvP and got banned from 4 or 5 different streaming sites before getting suspended from XIV? What about the people who get banned for using mods, only to have the devs turn around and put them into the game? What about the blatant disregard for the ToS by some people from the venue community? You walk into a club, you see a yell chat and ooooooh they're crafty. "My sink is named X and my sink's password is Y" as if someone's going to look at that and think "Oh, that person must have a smart sink." It's ridiculous. It's a clown show.

Now that you've built your argument around mistaking me for someone else, please move the goalposts.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

It's really not worth it to engage with you either, we're both clearly set in our own thoughts. You think the GM team is infallible, I think they're terrible and need to change to be better.

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I don't think they're infallible. They're human just as you and I are.

If you're going to come to a discussion forum where opposing opinions should be expected then refuse to engage with those that disagree with you, you're just showing how much of a Karen you are.

You referred to a different thread that ended up deleted and I felt I knew which one you're talking about. I thought you were the one that brought up the "Jesus spammer" but evidently misremembered. My apologies.

If your issue is the venue advertising, my comments still apply. Learn to fight your battles. Learn what is or isn't allowed. Venue advertisements in shout chat are allowed. Venue advertisements in PF are allowed. I've never seen venue ads reach the level of repetition by a single player that is required to be considered spam under the Prohibited Activities policy. The GM hands are tied on the matter. It's up to the development team to change the policy on venue advertising but opening tickets with the GMs isn't going to accomplish that. Your best bet is to submit a request once that the venue ad policy be reconsidered through Suggestions in the Support Desk.

The last thing the GM team needs to do is communicate more. That takes up their time that could be getting used to investigate and close tickets.

The GMs are not allowed to state the outcome of any report or whether action was taken period. This is not something that is discretionary on SE's part. It is mandatory due to online privacy laws in many countries. They cannot divulge information about specific players, which is what you want. The closest they can get are the weekly reports that get posted on Lodestone which display number of accounts banned for RMT/botting but not which accounts. They could add a section for bans due to social ToS violations and list the numbers but that probably still isn't going to give you the information you want.

Just what other games have told you "hey, we took action against that player you reported"? WoW never did when I was playing WoW. RIFT never did when I was playing RIFT. LotRO never did when I was playing LotRO. I didn't play DDO long enough to run into someone I needed to report so I don't know if they do or not and I haven't played any other MMOs. The response I always got, outside of one situation in WoW involving some fairly serious harassment, was "we've received your report and will investigate and take action in accordance with our policies" - which was not saying they actually took action, only that they would if it was appropriate.

There is no Prohibited Activity policy that address venue advertising frequency. You refuse to offer your personal definition of spam but based on what you say, it does not match the definition the GMs have been given to enforce the policy on chat spam.

I'm in the "GM team is generally good" camp because my interactions with the GM team have been positive though not perfect. There was one occasion where I did have to re-open my ticket to get to a GM that fully read and understood the actual issue (which I have to admit was a bit complicated).

I remember the thread about the person who claimed they were banned because they were killing too many mobs to spawn a S rank and pointed out that there's something fishy about that story because 1) other spawners aren't getting banned for doing the same thing and 2) notices of bans do not go into that much detail about the violation, nor do GMs offer additional clarification.

I don't remember the story about the PvP hacker so I can't comment because I don't know the details of exactly what happened.

The developers have been very clear about the policy on mod use. Don't use them because you'll be banned if caught by SE. If there is a game play problem that needs to be addressed, submit a Suggestion but it's still at the developers' discretion on whether the feature will be added to the game later. You're still subject to the ToS if you're using a mod to access the feature regardless of the feature being added at a later date because it was not part of the game at the time you were using the mod, thus giving you an unfair game advantage.

I have no clue what you're talking about when you say you go into venues and someone says "My sink is named X and my sink's password is Y". I don't go to venues and I ignore venue ads. Are you saying some venues are doxxing player account information or that they're trying to trick players into revealing their own? SE can't prevent player stupidity. Venues are a situation where you enter at your own risk because SE isn't responsible for online interactions between players if the situation doesn't clearly fall under prohibited policies.

You sounds like another of those players that thinks that SE is Mommy and Daddy and have to be responsible for protecting you from yourself and your own poor decision making.

They're not. You're presumably an adult. It's up to you to make decisions that are in your best interest and protect yourself.

There's no need to move goal posts here when you're still obsessing over petty stuff. The same advice still stands. Use blacklist and clear it out on a regular basis. Unless you can come up with better evidence that the venue advertising you're seeing is violating the Prohibited Activities policy, the GMs aren't going to do anything because such advertising is allowed as long as it is not sexually explicit and is not repeated in chat by one player frequently enough to reach their definition of spam.

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Spamming
Refers to using chat (including Quick Chat in PvP content and emotes) to obstruct the gameplay of others.
Key Points
The key point to consider is whether or not the behavior is obstructing another person's gameplay. While the intention may have not been to cause an obstruction, if the situation interferes with the communication of other players then it can be determined as a prohibited activity. If a report has been filed and the prohibited activity is confirmed, a penalty will be issued.

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Are you unable to play the game because someone is putting a venue advertisement in shout chat? Are you prevented from chatting with other players?

As for things being a clown show, welcome to the human race. There are a lot of fools out there but it's also easy to deal with the majority of them without any need to involve others.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

I don't think they're infallible. They're human just as you and I are.

If you're going to come to a discussion forum where opposing opinions should be expected then refuse to engage with those that disagree with you, you're just showing how much of a Karen you are.

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Look, I'm gonna be honest with you, after you called me a Karen again I stopped reading your post. You're not arguing in good faith and you've moved the goalposts, just as I said you would.

So let me be crystal clear. If I'm paying monthly to play a game, there needs to be good service. I don't see that in the GM team right now. I'm saying "the community needs better and needs to be better." You're sitting over there eating crap and trying to pass it off as german chocolate. If that's what you want to do, by all means that's your right as a human being. But don't come in here and tell me to try it too, because I'm gonna call it what it is. Complete and utter crap. I'm done engaging with you.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

Look, I'm gonna be honest with you, after you called me a Karen again I stopped reading your post. You're not arguing in good faith and you've moved the goalposts, just as I said you would.

So let me be crystal clear. If I'm paying monthly to play a game, there needs to be good service. I don't see that in the GM team right now. I'm saying "the community needs better and needs to be better." You're sitting over there eating crap and trying to pass it off as german chocolate. If that's what you want to do, by all means that's your right as a human being. But don't come in here and tell me to try it too, because I'm gonna call it what it is. Complete and utter crap. I'm done engaging with you.

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I'm not eating crap. I'm enjoying the game. It's rare that I run into other players that are engaging in action that constitutes violation of the ToS and need to be reported.

Sorry that you're not having the same experience. Good luck to you.

I see OP is still insistent that the GM are in the wrong. I am not saying they never mess up or are never wrong but if they looked at the report and deemed it not a rulebreak its the decision he/she deemed was the outcome. But we know this is just about your hate for venue pfs. Blacklist em if you need to. Solve your own problems like an adult.

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Originally Posted by Nyxs

I see OP is still insistent that the GM are in the wrong. I am not saying they never mess up or are never wrong but if they looked at the report and deemed it not a rulebreak its the decision he/she deemed was the outcome. But we know this is just about your hate for venue pfs. Blacklist em if you need to. Solve your own problems like an adult.

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Why are you like this? How are you content sitting there, covering your ears and going "lalalalalalala" ? Once more, for the umpteenth time this thread- which you'd know if you bothered to read it- I'm saying the community needs better from the GM team. Whether or not my issue is against ToS or not at this point is irrelevant. I'd love to see them do something about it, but if that's really your takeaway from all of this, you're quickly shaping up to be exhibit A for when I say the community needs to be better as well.

And just to take on to that as well, I don't even know if it breaks ToS or not. I don't think the GM who contacted me does either. Because when I explicitly asked them about it, the answer they gave me was a resounding "I dunno." So again, what am I supposed to think when I actually speak to a GM and find out they either don't understand their own rules, or their policies are so crap that they can't give me a straightforward yes or no answer?

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Originally Posted by Nyxs

I see OP is still insistent that the GM are in the wrong. I am not saying they never mess up or are never wrong but if they looked at the report and deemed it not a rulebreak its the decision he/she deemed was the outcome. But we know this is just about your hate for venue pfs. Blacklist em if you need to. Solve your own problems like an adult.

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The problem is the op is also right. There's countless instances of gms doing absolutely nothing even with evidence presented.

Alot won't even play the game because gms do nothing about stalkers/harassers.

The main issue is they can only do so much or they will end up in hot water. If they were given the green light and tools. Alot more would be acted on and alot more would find themselves in the gaol

Hey all,

I have been reading this thread and for pre context, spam doesn't really bother me.

That said, I do think however the emote text should be off by default - I've had to message 3 sprouts over the last week that were simply just playing with emotes but it was spamming chat to let them know they could be reported and receive action on their account if someone was vindictive enough to report them. I have then explained where the toggle is for it - which i really should have to do. (I've seen a few horror story's where ppl have been reported for this)

I think with spam, ppl need to just either switch their chat box to 'event' or move areas - how we've come to the era of text spam been reported e.g emotes from a new comer I'll never understand.

I think its wrong if ppl just want to see what each emote does cause it could be considered 'spam'.

*which I shouldn't have to do* - sorry on mobile can't edit. :)

Why would the GM action a single persons account for spam when it's multiple separate people advertising a venue? You're allowed to advertise your venue, even if you get fed up seeing multiple people from the same venue advertising it. You can block the people and soon we get the chat filters also. If they change policy to disallow groups from advertising RP venues then all it takes is a twat with a vendetta to advertise venues obnoxiously on purpose on an alt account to get other people associated with the venue in trouble. No action should be taken on a single persons account for the actions of other people.

Yes, we know, the gm's don't enforce the user agreement or issue account actions for prohibited behaviors unless you call someone a **** ******.

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Originally Posted by Aelin_Ashryver

Why would the GM action a single persons account for spam when it's multiple separate people advertising a venue? You're allowed to advertise your venue, even if you get fed up seeing multiple people from the same venue advertising it. You can block the people and soon we get the chat filters also. If they change policy to disallow groups from advertising RP venues then all it takes is a twat with a vendetta to advertise venues obnoxiously on purpose on an alt account to get other people associated with the venue in trouble. No action should be taken on a single persons account for the actions of other people.

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the term filter is already being circumvented by ad spammers, its dead in the water before its even released.

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Originally Posted by Aelin_Ashryver

Why would the GM action a single persons account for spam when it's multiple separate people advertising a venue? You're allowed to advertise your venue, even if you get fed up seeing multiple people from the same venue advertising it. You can block the people and soon we get the chat filters also. If they change policy to disallow groups from advertising RP venues then all it takes is a twat with a vendetta to advertise venues obnoxiously on purpose on an alt account to get other people associated with the venue in trouble. No action should be taken on a single persons account for the actions of other people.

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Why should an action be taken against a group of people if they're harassing you? It's the actions of multiple people, not just a single person. You're allowed to say what you want, even if the other person doesn't like it. I guess in that case the GMs have to throw their hands up and say "well it's multiple people, nothing we can do about it. If only if was a single person."

Come on. You're smarter than this.

Also just to add on- again- the blacklist isn't infinite. I'm not against advertisements. I'm against too many advertisements. I don't care if there's two or three, I care when there's 5+ because that's excessive. I don't think they should be suspended immediately. I think a GM should go in and say "hey, please tone it down a bit with the ads." If they ignore the warning, then they should have action taken against them.

Lets compare this to the real world for a moment. You can't honestly tell me you don't get frustrated seeing the same ad for the same thing 5 times in a row in the course of your day. It's like that. Nobody likes ads. That's why adblockers are so prominent. Unfortunately, there is no adblocker in XIV. You'd have to dip into third party plugins for that, which is, of course, blatantly against the Terms of Service. I shouldn't have to break the ToS to make my experience better. The blacklist is not a solution- not in its current form.

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Originally Posted by DivineP

Hey all,

I have been reading this thread and for pre context, spam doesn't really bother me.

That said, I do think however the emote text should be off by default - I've had to message 3 sprouts over the last week that were simply just playing with emotes but it was spamming chat to let them know they could be reported and receive action on their account if someone was vindictive enough to report them. I have then explained where the toggle is for it - which i really should have to do. (I've seen a few horror story's where ppl have been reported for this)

I think with spam, ppl need to just either switch their chat box to 'event' or move areas - how we've come to the era of text spam been reported e.g emotes from a new comer I'll never understand.

I think its wrong if ppl just want to see what each emote does cause it could be considered 'spam'.

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I broadly agree with what you're saying. If a sprout's "spamming" emotes to find out what they do and they get reported for it, that's what the action policy is for. Warning->3 day suspension->10 day suspension->20 day suspension->permanent suspension. In this particular case, I think receiving a warning would be too tough. All a GM has to do is pull the new player in and say "hey, just be careful, here's how you can turn it off if you so desire" and send them on their way. No "mark" on their account, no suspension, just an honest interaction.

Part of the problem, in my opinion, stems from when they skip the warning phase and go straight into a suspension. For example, I had someone join an FC I was in.... roughly 4 years ago? They had just started playing a couple days before joining us. Their name was unacceptable by SE standards. So, when they got reported, the GM took them in, suspended them for 3 days and of course told them they had to change their name. Sure it was "only" a 3 day suspension, but that decision- especially on a new player- was so outrageously dumb I'm still having a hard time believing they actually did it.

But to get back to your point about sprouts and emote spam- I don't think they should be getting penalized for the first "offense."

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

Why should an action be taken against a group of people if they're harassing you? It's the actions of multiple people, not just a single person. You're allowed to say what you want, even if the other person doesn't like it. I guess in that case the GMs have to throw their hands up and say "well it's multiple people, nothing we can do about it. If only if was a single person."

Come on. You're smarter than this.

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If you're suffering a coordinated harassment campaign and the GMs aren't doing anything about it, that would be bad. That said, spam and venue ads aren't harassment which is why they are covered by different clauses.

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Originally Posted by Sjol

If you're suffering a coordinated harassment campaign and the GMs aren't doing anything about it, that would be bad. That said, spam and venue ads aren't harassment which is why they are covered by different clauses.

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Man that's crazy. I'm sure nobody's suffered a coordinated harassment campaign before and watched as the GMs did nothing.

Not defending it but... It's a sticky situation with any report.

Not all reports are sanctioned the same, and depending on how detailed you were with it, is only something that would be in a vacuum, it really heavily depends on GM interpretation more than anything, and certain things I imagine they just cannot disclose and I would say probably due to policy given how uniform it is behind disclosing information, I probably wouldn't even put it on the GM, but rather those above the GMs, e.g., managerial. So I don't think it is incompetence nor incredibly stretched thinly with resources, though it could still be the case, but I don't think it would be due to your outlined reasons.

Another thing that makes this difficult is a lot of bans are arguably down to interaction, and the problem is if you are too willing to share information on the report, it only encourages the person to query more information, and you really do run the risk of oversharing information which potentially exposes 'data' on the person who made the report.

Is it fair on the person who needs to reflect? Nah -- Because they run the risk of repeating same mistakes, and it's just running in blind, and makes people overly anxious on what their sanction was actually based on.

But in the same vein there are reasons why it is how it is. I personally wouldn't put it all on the GMs.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

Man that's crazy. I'm sure nobody's suffered a coordinated harassment campaign before and watched as the GMs did nothing.

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I'm sure there have been and I hope something was done about those GMs who ignored harassment. I don't think you'll get a lot of pushback on the idea that GMs should be doing something about harassment, and especially coordinated harassment.

You've also mentioned being upset at GMs not knowing what is and isn't against the ToS. They don't know what's against the ToS and stating that something is or isn't would likely get them fired. The ToS are a legal contract between you and SE. The GM has zero ability to interpret the actual ToS and making a legal interpretation of it would so go beyond their role that I'm sure they've gotten quite strict instructions on not saying anything about that because what they say can be used in court as an official stance of the company.

They probably wouldn't even be able to talk about internal policy, because it's internal and as soon as it gets out individual GMs would be held to account, dramatically limiting the community team's discretion on how to resolve issues. There are reasons why these things are like they are, and you may not like them -- many people don't -- but they're there to protect SE.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

Snip

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What has targeted harassment got to do with RP venue ads? You have no proper rebuttal to my response so you move the goal post to harassment or what? And I understand you said you dislike the excessive ads, but I don't agree a single person should get a warning for something when they as an individual are doing ONE thing, posting a pf or single shout in an area for their venue. That one thing is not against ToS, harassment is. It's not the same. If you reported each member of a group for harassing you they each as an individual are breaking ToS and should be actioned for it.

And I fully get the hating of seeing the same add over and over, there is a brand of shampoo with a kangaroo logo I seen so often on twitch ads I vowed to never buy it I got so sick of seeing it. I do the same if I see the same ad for a venue too much, I won't bother visiting. The filter coming for the game soon will help a lot, I also personally just filter out the shout chat when I am in the cities by swapping to another chat tab with only FC and party chat. I don't need to use any 3rd party to manage the annoyance of the venue shouts. Also if we keep with the rl comparison as much as you hate seeing the same ad on repeat, it's not illegal or punishable. You can filter it out with ad block and refuse to purchase the products of those companies whom you found the marketing of to be irritating.

It just comes across that you have been reporting people advertising their venue but each person on their own has not broke any ToS, they are not spamming the chat excessively and can only make a single PF on their own. Venue PF's are also by default way at the bottom of the list when you first open it, all I see any time I open pf is raids. If I want to pop to a venue I have to filter to other. And if a venue is putting their PF in the wrong category you can report them for that, same for if they shove 18+ or "courts" in the ad also.

We have the means currently to handle the ads, we have more incoming and if players advertising their venue's change their ads in a way to specifically avoid the filters we players use maybe we can make a case that is reportable. Because that's not something you do without forethought and it's intentionally trying to subvert a game system. If they do that I'd be in favour of punishing those players, because they are purposefully dodging a game system to get to players who have taken steps to avoid their ads. Not unlike going on an alt to bother someone who has blocked your main.

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Originally Posted by Sjol

I'm sure there have been and I hope something was done about those GMs who ignored harassment. I don't think you'll get a lot of pushback on the idea that GMs should be doing something about harassment, and especially coordinated harassment.

You've also mentioned being upset at GMs not knowing what is and isn't against the ToS. They don't know what's against the ToS and stating that something is or isn't would likely get them fired. The ToS are a legal contract between you and SE. The GM has zero ability to interpret the actual ToS and making a legal interpretation of it would so go beyond their role that I'm sure they've gotten quite strict instructions on not saying anything about that because what they say can be used in court as an official stance of the company.

They probably wouldn't even be able to talk about internal policy, because it's internal and as soon as it gets out individual GMs would be held to account, dramatically limiting the community team's discretion on how to resolve issues. There are reasons why these things are like they are, and you may not like them -- many people don't -- but they're there to protect SE.

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This argument isn't meant to come off as hostile, so please do not take it that way.

The way I understood it was that it was the EULA that was the legal agreement and that the TOS is more of a "social" agreement? I'm not a lawyer, I'm not versed whatsoever in legal matters, the only legal education I have is from watching lawyers on youtube, so I'm completely out of my depth when it comes to this particular discussion.

That out of the way.... If the GMs don't know what's against ToS, what exactly is the point of the GM team? Because if they can't make decisions, if they can't interpret the ToS, why do they exist? Someone at the company has to be able to make decisions. From a player standpoint, I'd assume that would be the GM team. If it's not them, then that just reinforces my belief that they're ineffective- whether that be due to being held back by policies from higher ups, or due to general incompetency on their end. I think there needs to better- for both players and GMs.

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Originally Posted by Aelin_Ashryver

What has targeted harassment got to do with RP venue ads? You have no proper rebuttal to my response so you move the goal post to harassment or what?

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No, I just don't think you actually understand what the discussion is here.

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

This argument isn't meant to come off as hostile, so please do not take it that way.

The way I understood it was that it was the EULA that was the legal agreement and that the TOS is more of a "social" agreement? I'm not a lawyer, I'm not versed whatsoever in legal matters, the only legal education I have is from watching lawyers on youtube, so I'm completely out of my depth when it comes to this particular discussion.

That out of the way.... If the GMs don't know what's against ToS, what exactly is the point of the GM team? Because if they can't make decisions, if they can't interpret the ToS, why do they exist? Someone at the company has to be able to make decisions. From a player standpoint, I'd assume that would be the GM team. If it's not them, then that just reinforces my belief that they're ineffective- whether that be due to being held back by policies from higher ups, or due to general incompetency on their end. I think there needs to better- for both players and GMs.

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No feelings of hostility taken. I've done work in the legal industry on the software side and ToS are legal documents that do come up in court. While you agreed to the ToS, GM responses are typically controlled by a company confidential set of policies and rules. GMs will likely be given a set of standards to go by and training in order to handle most GM tickets. Tricky ones will be escalated, sometimes more than once up the chain to people who are aware of the consequences of different actions in terms of company reputation and legal consequences. If it's really bad, the internal legal team will be brought in, but that's extremely rare.

The different tier of decision-making is there to be as cost-efficient as possible. You also generally don't want a ton of people capable of deciding things because they will not come to a consensus, so they're mostly just there to run a playbook that tells them how to respond to specific scenarios. If it's not in the playbook, it'll very likely be escalated. It's a pretty common strategy in all call-center like customer support environments. GMs just do it over text.

So, the GM is going to look at your request, check the playbook and make a decision if it lines up to one of their pre-described responses. RMT, instant ban; Stolen account, redirect the customer or handle it; etc. The sad reality is that GMs are often minimum wage (or lower) and are not trusted to do much of anything. A lot of companies I know of are trying to replace them with AI as quickly as possible even when they don't get paid much to begin with. So, you're sadly at the whims of a) how good the playbook is; b) how overworked the GM is; and c) how good their escalation policy is.

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Originally Posted by Aelin_Ashryver

Why would the GM action a single persons account for spam when it's multiple separate people advertising a venue? You're allowed to advertise your venue, even if you get fed up seeing multiple people from the same venue advertising it. You can block the people and soon we get the chat filters also. If they change policy to disallow groups from advertising RP venues then all it takes is a twat with a vendetta to advertise venues obnoxiously on purpose on an alt account to get other people associated with the venue in trouble. No action should be taken on a single persons account for the actions of other people.

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I think most don't understand why people have a issue. The ones who hang in cities tend to have convos and nothing annoys a person more then walls of text from shoutrunners.

I mean they don't actually spam (unlike certain venues on pf) but it's just that wall of text that can break a convo badly and ppl gotta open up chat log to see last thing said.

Even worse when you got several ads popping off. If shouts were down to a sentence or two. I'm sure people wouldn't actually mind.

Although, there's others who realize that 13 is the youngest age according to tos and some even younger play. So they don't want them exposed to it.

Can a gm do anything. Not really. Not without hitting pfs as well as they should be for spam.

I think their fix is this filter thing coming in. So people can add stuff to it so they don't see the stuff.

Venues should be figuring out another avenue to advert with as shoutrunners gonna be increasingly deafened amd I don't mean more spam on pf. Maybe use fellowships for what it was meant for

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Originally Posted by Kazmarek

This argument isn't meant to come off as hostile, so please do not take it that way.

The way I understood it was that it was the EULA that was the legal agreement and that the TOS is more of a "social" agreement? I'm not a lawyer, I'm not versed whatsoever in legal matters, the only legal education I have is from watching lawyers on youtube, so I'm completely out of my depth when it comes to this particular discussion.

That out of the way.... If the GMs don't know what's against ToS, what exactly is the point of the GM team? Because if they can't make decisions, if they can't interpret the ToS, why do they exist? Someone at the company has to be able to make decisions. From a player standpoint, I'd assume that would be the GM team. If it's not them, then that just reinforces my belief that they're ineffective- whether that be due to being held back by policies from higher ups, or due to general incompetency on their end. I think there needs to better- for both players and GMs.

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When you pulled into the gaol for breaching tos. You will figure out what ruled the gms enforce lol

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Originally Posted by Ravenblade1979

I think most don't understand why people have a issue. The ones who hang in cities tend to have convos and nothing annoys a person more then walls of text from shoutrunners.

I mean they don't actually spam (unlike certain venues on pf) but it's just that wall of text that can break a convo badly and ppl gotta open up chat log to see last thing said.

Even worse when you got several ads popping off. If shouts were down to a sentence or two. I'm sure people wouldn't actually mind.

Although, there's others who realize that 13 is the youngest age according to tos and some even younger play. So they don't want them exposed to it.

Can a gm do anything. Not really. Not without hitting pfs as well as they should be for spam.

I think their fix is this filter thing coming in. So people can add stuff to it so they don't see the stuff.

Venues should be figuring out another avenue to advert with as shoutrunners gonna be increasingly deafened amd I don't mean more spam on pf. Maybe use fellowships for what it was meant for

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They've already started figuring it out by adding symbols and other changes to spelling and such to their ads. People just gonna have to keep up with lingo changes I guess.

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Originally Posted by Ravenblade1979

Although, there's others who realize that 13 is the youngest age according to tos and some even younger play. So they don't want them exposed to it.

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Kids younger than 13 (or whatever the rated age is for the country a person is in) shouldn't be there if the parent is uncomfortable with the rated content. And parents should be especially careful around online interactions which aren't rated because it would be completely impractical.

As an aside, I guess my experience has been very different from the people complaining about ads in shout. Certainly, I've seen them, though many aren't advertised as being of a sexual nature. They also don't show up that frequently. I'm also on a congested server, so I wouldn't imagine it's because the server is especially dead. It's entirely possible this problem varies greatly from server-to-server.

And personally, I loathe spam and ads, in general. That said, I do recognize that they're part of our post-1900s world and a primary way of getting the word out about your venture or venue. And I do appreciate that the majority of them keep it to private spaces and their ads as salacious-free as possible (at least on my server when I'm looking which is a lot of caveats).

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Originally Posted by LianaThorne

They've already started figuring it out by adding symbols and other changes to spelling and such to their ads. People just gonna have to keep up with lingo changes I guess.

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Lol it's not hard to add all variants of a venue name to cover all bases.

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Originally Posted by Sjol

Kids younger than 13 (or whatever the rated age is for the country a person is in) shouldn't be there if the parent is uncomfortable with the rated content. And parents should be especially careful around online interactions which aren't rated because it would be completely impractical.

As an aside, I guess my experience has been very different from the people complaining about ads in shout. Certainly, I've seen them, though many aren't advertised as being of a sexual nature. They also don't show up that frequently. I'm also on a congested server, so I wouldn't imagine it's because the server is especially dead. It's entirely possible this problem varies greatly from server-to-server.

And personally, I loathe spam and ads, in general. That said, I do recognize that they're part of our post-1900s world and a primary way of getting the word out about your venture or venue. And I do appreciate that the majority of them keep it to private spaces and their ads as salacious-free as possible (at least on my server when I'm looking which is a lot of caveats).

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I think I read here on the forums or somewhere. A young girl who was playing (who is supervised) went to their parent to ask what a court was. Someone in game decided to try to recruit the player for court work.

It's like....gotta be kidding me.